Alvin Ailey Biography

Born: January 5, 1931
Rogers, Texas
Died: December 1, 1989
New York, New York
African American dancer and choreographer

Alvin Ailey founded the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre and won
international fame as both a dancer and choreographer, a creator and
arranger of dance performances.

Rough beginning

Alvin Ailey Jr. was born to Alvin and Lula Elizabeth Ailey on January 5,
1931, in Rogers, Texas. He was an only child, and his father, a laborer,
left the family when Alvin Jr. was less than one year old. At the age of
six, Alvin Jr. moved with his mother to Navasota, Texas. As he recalled
in an interview in the
New York Daily News Magazine,
"There was the white school up on the hill, and the black
Baptist church, and the segregated [only members of one race allowed]
theaters and neighborhoods. Like most of my generation, I grew up
feeling like an outsider, like someone who didn't matter."

In 1942 Ailey and his mother moved to Los Angeles, California, where his
mother found work in an aircraft factory. Ailey became interested in
athletics and joined his high school gymnastics team and played
football. An admirer of dancers Gene Kelly (1912–1996) and Fred
Astaire (1899–1987), he also took tap dancing lessons at a
neighbor's home. His interest in dance grew when a friend took
him to visit the modern dance school run by Lester Horton, whose dance
company (a group of dancers who perform together) was the first in
America to admit members of all races. Unsure of what opportunities
would be available for him as a dancer, however, Ailey left
Horton's school after one month. After graduating from high
school in 1948, Ailey considered becoming a teacher. He entered the
University of California in Los Angeles to study languages. When Horton
offered him a scholarship in 1949 Ailey returned to the dance school. He
left again after one year, however, this time to attend San Francisco
State College.

Early career

For a time Ailey danced in a nightclub in San Francisco, California,
then he returned to the Horton school to finish his training. When
Horton took the company east for a performance in New York City in 1953,
Ailey was with him. When Horton died suddenly, the young Ailey took
charge as the company's artistic director. Following
Horton's style, Ailey choreographed two pieces that were
presented at the Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival in Becket,
Massachusetts. After the works
received poor reviews from the festival manager, the troupe broke up.

Despite the setback, Ailey's career stayed on track. A Broadway
producer invited him to dance in
House of Flowers,
a musical based on Truman Capote's (1924–1984) book.
Ailey continued taking dance classes while performing in the show. He
also studied ballet and acting. From the mid-1950s through the early
1960s Ailey appeared in many musical productions on and off Broadway,
among them:
The Carefree Tree; Sing, Man, Sing; Jamaica;
and
Call Me By My Rightful Name.
He also played a major part in the play
Tiger, Tiger, Burning Bright.

In 1958 Ailey and another dancer with an interest in choreographing
recruited dancers to perform several concerts at the 92nd Street Young
Men's and Young Women's Hebrew Association in New York
City, a place where modern dances and the works of new choreographers
were seen. Ailey's first major piece,
Blues Suite,
was inspired by blues music. The performance drew praise. Ailey then
scheduled a second concert to present his own works, and then a third,
which featured his most famous piece,
Revelations.
Accompanied by the elegant jazz music of Duke Ellington
(1899–1974),
Revelations
pulled the audience into African American religious life.

Established own dance company

In 1959 Ailey established the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, a
group of eight black dancers. One year later, the theater became the
resident dance company at the Clark Center for the Performing Arts in
New York City. By the mid-1960s Ailey, who struggled with his weight,
gave up dancing in favor

Alvin Ailey.
Reproduced by permission of

AP/Wide World Photos

.

of choreography. He also oversaw business details as the director of
his ambitious dance company. By 1968 the company had received funding
from private and public organizations but still had money problems, even
as it brought modern dance to audiences around the world. Ailey also had
the leading African American soloist (a person who performs by oneself)
of modern dance, Judith Jamison (1944–). Having employed Asian
and white dancers since the mid-1960s, Ailey had also integrated
(included people of different races) his company. In 1969 the company
moved to Brooklyn, New York, as the resident dance
company of the Brooklyn Academy of Music, an arts center with three
theaters.

In the early 1960s the company performed in Southeast Asia and Australia
as part of an international cultural program set up by President John F.
Kennedy (1917–1963). Later the company traveled to Brazil,
Europe, and West Africa. Ailey also choreographed dances for other
companies, including
Feast of Ashes
for the Joffrey Ballet and
Anthony and Cleopatra
for the Metropolitan Opera at Lincoln Center in New York City. Ailey
worked on projects with other artists, including one with Duke Ellington
for the American Ballet Theater. For Ailey the decade peaked with the
performance of
Masekela Language,
a dance based on the music of Hugh Masekela, a black South African
trumpeter who lived in exile for speaking out against apartheid (South
Africa's policy of separation based on race).

Ailey's
Cry

By the late 1970s Ailey's company was one of America's
most popular dance troupes. Its members continued touring around the
world, with U.S. State Department backing. They were the first modern
dancers to visit the former Soviet Union since the 1920s. In 1971
Ailey's company was asked to return to the City Center Theater in
New York City after a performance featured Ailey's celebrated
solo,
Cry.
Danced by Judith Jamison, she made it one of the troupe's best
known pieces.

Dedicated to "all black women everywhere—especially our
mothers," the piece depicts the struggles of different
generations of black American women. It begins with the unwrapping of a
long white scarf that becomes many things during the course of the
dance, and ends with an expression of belief and happiness danced to the
late 1960s song, "Right On, Be Free." Of this and of all
his works Ailey told John Gruen in
The Private World of Ballet,
"I am trying to express something that I feel about people,
life, the human spirit, the beauty of things.…"

Later years

Ailey suffered a breakdown in 1980 that put him in the hospital for
several weeks. At the time he had lost a close friend, was going through
a midlife crisis, and was experiencing money problems. Still, he
continued to work, and his reputation as a founding father of modern
dance grew during the decade.

Ailey received many honors for his choreography, including a
Dance
magazine award in 1975; the Springarn Medal, given to him by the
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in
1979; and the Capezio Award that same year. In 1988 he was awarded the
Kennedy Center Honors prize. Ailey died of a blood disorder on December
1, 1989. Thousands of people flocked to the memorial service held for
him at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine.

Alvin Ailey is such an inspiration to everyone who has read an article about him. You don't even have to know him to feel what he felt. I go to a Alvin Ailey Camp and we are learning the Horton and many more dances as well. I hope to become a wonderful dancer like Judith Jamison or Alvin Ailey.

Comment about this article, ask questions, or add new information about this topic: